


Portraits hung in empty halls

by ishafel



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling, Lymond Chronicles - Dorothy Dunnett
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-01-26
Updated: 2011-01-26
Packaged: 2017-10-15 02:57:28
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 388
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/156321
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ishafel/pseuds/ishafel
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>For pushdragon, who wanted to know whether the fair haired, light-eyed Malfoys were descended from the fair haired, light-eyed Crawfords.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Portraits hung in empty halls

Draco's least favorite of all the ancestors is Khaireddin Crawford, whose portrait is in the gallery, third from the end on the left. He is a Malfoy twice over by birth, but an illegitimate one, from a cadet branch: married into the main line by a combination of good fortune and force of will. He does not have the white gold hair of a true Malfoy, or the silver eyes, but there is a look about him of Lucius Malfoy, and even more of Draco's grandfather Abraxas.

He was a dangerous man in his time, Khaireddin: John Dee's apprentice, and Essex's lover, and beloved of two queens, each of them more dangerous than the other. His parents were brother and sister, and lay together in the old fashion of the pharaohs, and he was raised by Muggles of noble estate. He married Astraea Malfoy when he was nineteen and she was eleven. He helped Drake, who was Minister of Magic, drive back the Spanish; he betrayed each of the rulers of England and Scotland in turn, for two centuries. He was a Malfoy, and treachery was the very blood in his veins.

But there is something else in his face that Draco does not like. Not cruelty: he has seen cruelty on the faces of his father and grandfather, on his own face in the mirror, and he knows how it looks. And not cleverness, either, though by all accounts Khaireddin was clever. It is not a look Draco is equipped to recognize, not quite yet. His father has done his best to keep him clear, though his childhood will not last forever.

He will know it, the next time he sees it. He will be able to put a name to it, when it is in Lord Voldemort's eyes, and he will fear it then, too. Maybe, in the end, it will save him. But now all it means is that he takes the servants' passage from the ballroom to the East wing, rather than face his ancestor; that he does not practice quidditch in that endless gallery. He is a Malfoy, and he hates the things he fears, and when the house is his, he will burn Khaireddin in his heavy golden frame. Malfoys keep the promises they make to themselves, if they keep no others.


End file.
